Stressed Teens is a business that began in 2004 and disseminates the evidence-based Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction for Teens Program (MBSR-T) (Biegel, 2009a, 2009b, 2014, 2017) in varying forms. Stressed Teens teaches mindfulness skills and provides tools for those in their pre-teen years through latter adolescence and even for young adults. Stressed Teens takes a mind-body approach and focuses on the whole person. Teens often have difficulty with their social skills, emotions, confidence, procrastination, impulsivity, and attention. Stressed Teens can improve a teen’s functioning and quality of living socially, physically, and psychologically.
MBSR-T is an adaptation of the Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) program for adults (Kabat-Zinn, 1982, 1990, 2013). The MBSR-T intervention is closely related to the traditional MBSR program created by Kabat-Zinn and colleagues. The MBSR-T program is meant to be a program to use with adolescents and young adults versus the traditional MBSR program for adults. Like MBSR, MBSR-T is based on secular adaptations of mindfulness practices with roots in Eastern meditation traditions. MBSR-T is also strongly influenced by mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (Segal, Williams, & Teasdale, 2002, 2013).
Mindfulness is noticing your thoughts, feelings, and physical sensations in the present moment without harmful judgement. Mindfulness can be cultivated through both formal and informal mindfulness practices. The formal practices taught are similar to those in adult MBSR, but their duration is shortened to accommodate the attention span of adolescents. Emphasis is also given to mindful qualities of living, informal practice, and developing an awareness of one’s thoughts. It appears, through experience in MBSR-T, that teens often benefit from activities that focus on noticing and awareness of self-other judgments, worries, things out of one’s control, and pain and suffering. Many mental health difficulties arise from these aforementioned thoughts.
Click Here for a Free Handout on Mindfulness and Positive Neuroplasticity Defined
One can become more mindful--aware of their senses, thoughts, and feelings. Once you are mindful you can choose where you want to direct your attention. Teens can focus on that one dislike, or negative comment someone said about them, or they can direct their attention to the myriad of positive statements and moments.
MBSR-T teaches fundamental and foundational mindfulness skills and then encourages teens to direct their attention to the positive, to self-care, to direct their attention on that which nourishes and fills them up rather than on that which drains and depletes them. The focus in on 'Taking in the Good' attending to positive coping skills and decreasing energy and brain time on negative coping skills.
Taking in the good is taking care of yourself and feeling good in the moment. It is also about taking in, really noticing, and enjoying those self-care activities that you do. In this way, you are adding coins to your bank. Those coins have stored up and are like resource coins that will help you be better able to tolerate and manage whatever difficulties life throws your way—stressors, disappointments, and the like.
Positive neuroplasticity indicates that by attending to a pleasant or positive activity—the “taking in the good of it”—even for a short period of time throughout the day, you increase your mental tilt toward the positive and the likelihood of growing positive neural connections that move away from the automatic tendency toward a negative tilt.
To “take in the good,” you need to have positive and beneficial experiences to “take in.” Think about building a campfire. To get a fire going you need materials—wood, kindling, and matches. Positive and beneficial experiences are the materials—those positive and pleasant moments in your life, whether big or small, that you can “take in.” When a campfire burns bright, it is like when an experience fills you with a sense of happiness, contentment, satisfaction, peace, joy, and well-being. When you notice, and attend to the pleasant and positive aspects of your beneficial experiences, this is the process of taking in the good. When you take in the good, you get to enjoy the moment and benefit from it while the experience is taking place. Enjoy your campfire while it is burning.
If you attend to and savor the experience for a mere thirty seconds, you are creating a lasting resource for your well-being bank.
To Read More on Taking in the Good Click Here
MBSR-T does not claim to be a panacea. It is also not a magic bullet for all teens, in all settings, in all conditions. At times, other therapeutic approaches or medication management may be clinically indicated and more appropriate. When teaching MBSR-T clinically, educationally, individually, or in group settings, it is imperative that you follow the applicable laws and the ethics of your profession, as well as the reporting responsibilities you must uphold.
With those caveats in mind, the possible benefits of learning MBSR-T are many.
Click here to read more on the peer-reviewed journal articles on MBSR-T.
The drop-in practice guides you to connect to your body, breath, and mind--both thoughts and feelings. It is as easy as 1-2-3. 1. Body 2. Breath 3. Mind
MBSR-T has strong foundations in developmental theory and considers the cognitive and attentional abilities of youth, as well as the cultural life of today’s teenagers, for whom changes occur rapidly in how they form relationships and allocate their attention. MBSR-T seeks to meet teens where they are developmentally and use language, references, and stories that are relevant to them. MBSR-T maintains the integrity of its foundations in psychology and mindfulness, while creating interventions pertinent to today’s 21st-century teen.
MBSR-T has been used and researched in a number of settings: in- and after-school, outpatient therapeutic settings, autistic spectrum disorder clinics, positive youth development programs, and pediatric hospitals (this is not an exhaustive list). It is appropriate for individual, family, and group settings (clinical or educational), and distribution of this curriculum continues to broaden. It can be used as a stand-alone program or as an adjunct to other forms of treatment and modalities. MBSR-T is not meant to replace a successful medication regimen or ongoing psychological treatment, although the skills learned may reduce the need for other treatments. The intention for MBSR-T is for teens to learn skills and tools that will help them function more adaptively and improve their quality of life. To look at some of the published evidence-based research studies click here
Download a Chapter from the new book Be Mindful & Stress Less: 50 Ways to Deal with Your Crazy Life to learn ways to help teens and young adults be on their own side.
Learn more about Spacious and Directed Awareness Download Here
To download a list of ways teens can 'Take in the Good' Click Here
To download a 1-page full color handout of 25 Healthy and Positive Copings Skills Click Here
